


Giving thanks in the Fallout

by karrenia_rune



Category: Stargate SG-1, Warehouse 13
Genre: Crossovers & Fandom Fusions, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-17
Updated: 2014-07-17
Packaged: 2018-02-09 05:47:54
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,449
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1971246
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/karrenia_rune/pseuds/karrenia_rune
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Pete is a bit leery when it comes to accept Myka's invitation to join her for Thanksgiving at her family's house in Colorado Springs, but eventually accepts, but what they find going on there throws the 'everyday weirdness' meter into high gear. And that's just the beginning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Giving thanks in the Fallout

Disclaimer: Stargate SG-1 and the characters, themes etc, belong to MGM, Geeko Film Corp, Wright Productions and are not mine. Warehouse 13 belongs to the SyFy Channel and its creators.  
"Giving Thanks in the Fallout" by Karrenia

Pete Latimer had been a little bit leery about accepting Myka's invitation to visit her parents in Colorado Springs for the Thanksgiving Holiday weekend but then they had been working together for a long time now and he really since he did not have any other plans so he had replied: "Sure, Why Not?"

In hindsight he really should have known better than to utter the following phrase: "What could possibly go wrong?" But he had and now here there were and Pete was not sure if he should be angry or simply resigned by now.

Myka Bering had to wonder if the Air Force Colonel who had delivered the sealed documents containing her uncle's letter and a tersely worded explanation of how her uncle had died in the line of duty fighting against an enemy that Colonel Jack O'Neill could somehow never quite manage to explain in full detail; made her want to punch something or someone. Too bad he did not stick around enough to provided a convenient and immediate target.

While she had fondly hoped that in a way of coming home to Colorado Springs that it would provide a much needed and welcome release from stresses of her job; allow her a such to unwind.

Oh, the fact that she had been placed in similar awkward situations, faced other family members as the deliverer of the bad news that a brother, a sister, a husband or a wife had died in the line of duty was not the problem.

After all, she had never been naive enough that it could never happen to her or any member of her family especially when their work had taken them into the higher levels of both the United States government and the armed forces.

‘The fact of the matter,', she thought, "Is there's something terribly wrong with this picture, but for the life of me I just can't seem to get it to gel together enough to figure out exactly what that something is.'  
While she was turning over this thought in her mind Pete came over from the kitchen where her folks were occupied in washing up the dishes from dinner; in his hand, this was evidence that he had been into the plate of chocolate chip cookies. The crumbs on his jacket and pants was a dead giveaway, and she knew even before he asked that he wanted to be sure that she was ‘all right’.

“You gonna be okay,” asked Pete quietly.

Myka nodded and offered her partner a small tremulous smile. “Eventually.”  
****

Outside the quiet suburban neighborhood in Colorado Springs Claudia Donavan was browsing the storefronts of curio and bookshops when and doing a little crowd watching at the same time. She had needed to get out of the house something fierce, seeing as her friends did not seem in any hurry to get out of the house and go skiing as they had planned before setting out on this trip.

She had just picked up a thickly bound volume in an antiquarian book dealer’s shop when a noise and a loud crash outside the store caught her attention. Realizing that what she held in her hands was both rare, a treatise written by Tycho Brae in the 18th century she carefully placed back on the shelf before hurrying outside at a dead run.

Outside a crowd had gathered, muttering, exclaiming, and looking up to the sky, and pointing at something or other, but given her short stature and vantage point she could not quite make out what everyone was looking at.

Myka pushed and shoved her way to the front of the crowd ignoring the shouts and angry looks of those she jostled and finally got a good look at what was happening. At first, she thought someone had called in the National Guard or the folks at the nearby army base were conducting some sort of mock-battle.

Facing off against what looked like hard-shelled armored soldiers were a group of military types who had accompanied Colonel O’Neill to the Bering’s home to inform them of the death of their nephew and Myka’s uncle.

He was not alone, for a woman with short-cut blond hair, a blond man who looked cute in a geeky sort of way, and a tall well-built black man with a golden sigil tattooed on his forehead were blasting away at the hard-shelled opponents.

It appeared that they were holding their own; however Claudia had never been much of an expert on military matters, or weaponry. In the back of her mind, she thought, “Tough time to learn. I should talk to Artie about letting me go out on missions. Science and computers I know forwards, backward and inside out, ‘This,‘ is a whole new ball of wax.‘.

She took her attention off the fight long enough to rummage through her purse for her cell phone and quickly dialed Peter’s number. It rang five or six times before he picked up.

“Pete, it’s Claudia, I’m at the intersection between Humboldt and 57th Street and you’d best get yourself and Myka here pronto. I see it and even I don’t believe it.”

“What are you talking about?” Pete asked.

“You remember how close-mouthed that O’Neill guy was about the circumstances of Ian’s death? How he would only give Myka’s family sketchy details about the circumstances.”

“Yeah, something about how he died in the line of duty. It’s air-force and it’s military, and typical brass euphemisms, what do you expect?” Pete replied.

“I think they were hiding a lot more than they let in,” Claudia said.

“Probably for a good reason. Besides, that’s really no business of ours,” Peter remarked.

“Well, get here as soon as you can, because whatever it is they’re hiding and for whatever reason, some of it just spilled over into the daylight…” See you soon, “ Claudia said and ended the call.  
***  
Pete shook his head and thought ‘Claudia’s a good kid, a smart kid to boot, and I’m well aware that she would not make up something like this on a whim or as her idea of a practical joke.’ On the heels of that thought he made a decision to come and check out the situation. He reached over and placed one hand on Myka’s shoulder. “Myka?

“I’m all right.” she replied with a shake of her head and then reached up to brush away a swath of her that had fallen down to get into her eyes.

“Hey, you up to going out? Claudia just called and from the sound of it, I think she might be in trouble. Why don’t we check it out?” he said.

Myka nodded. “Okay, sounds like a plan,” she replied with that familiar gleam in her eye and the calm, confident tone in her voice that he had come to know so well in the years that they had been partners. “Let’s go.”  
**  
Encounter

When they arrived, Claudia had already taken up a position on a retaining wall that someone had built around an immaculately landscaped yard and apparently had chosen to divide her activities from alternating through loose stones and yelling both encouragements and insults as the mood struck he; oblivious to her own safety in doing so.

Not only that but Colonel Jack O’Neill and his small group had managed to disperse the ground and were now in the process of mopping up what looked to both Myka and Pete’ as the remains of some kind of highly refined glossy matte black metal that had once been part of some kind of high tech armor.

“What the hell went on here?” Pete demanded.

“I could tell you,” O’Neill replied his voice steady and judging by both his tone of voice and body language that whatever had gone down here he was no more willing to reveal as much as he really knew as he had been back at the elder Bering’s home. “I could tell you,” Jack O’Neill repeated, before adding, dead-panned, “but then I’d have to kill you.”

Pete Latimer had been working with both politicians and military officers off and on for the better part of ten or fifteen years and he had seen both the good and the bad, and in the indifferent come and go in that time; but to his way of thinking, while he could well understand O’Neill’s need to keep top secret information or even not so secret information out of the hands of the general public; he really needed to ‘know’; this time.

“Don’t hand me that crap,” Pete shouted. “Air Force officers or not, we do have connections in high places…”

“Is that a threat?” O’Neill replied.

“No, Sir. I just want to know who you’re dealing with.”

“We’re…”Myka began, “Uh, part of the Secret Service, and I can show your ID badges, except that I must have left them in my other wallet.”

“Yeah, likely story,” Daniel remarked caustically.

“Sir,” a blond woman came over, “Might I suggest we go somewhere,” she looked around, “somewhere less crowded?”

“Good idea, Carter,” O’Neill replied.

Myka walked over and folding her hands over her chest. “For the record, this is no longer just a personal matter for me. I understand why you could only tell me that Ian Bering died in the line of duty…”

“Colonel O’Neill,” the big man added. “We do not have time for this.”

“Fine, make time,” Myka replied.

“I can understand how she feels,” the blond man remarked with a distant look in his bright blue eyes.

“Daniel Jackson, not you too? Oh, for cryin’ out loud,” O’Neill muttered under his breath.

“Since when does the Secret Service get mixed up with the Air Force?” Daniel Jackson shook his head. “This might take a while.”

“It is complicated,” the big man added.

At that moment Claudia Donavan came running over and nodding to both Myka Bering and Peter Latimer said “Wow, that was some party. Remind me to mail you guys thank you card later. In the meantime, I‘m with them, and I want in.”

“Not now, Claudia,” Pete sighed.

“If not now, then when?” she replied.

“All right, all right,” O’Neill griped. “Let’s just get this over with.”  
***  
“Myka Bering, and that’s Pete Latimer.”

“Colonel Jack O’Neill, United States Air Force.”

“Since we’re being all polite do you mind….

“Samantha Carter, Doctor Daniel Jackson, and that is Teal’C.’

“Nice to met all you,” Myka replied. “Well…..”

Samantha Carter shook her head and sighed. “Look, I don’t know if you really are Secret Service or not, but the fact that Ian Bering was a member of our unit is not a factor in this meeting.”

“You feel that by coming in person to inform me of his death, you did your duty by Ian then?” Myka demanded.

“You said it yourself earlier, that is no longer personal. Lives were at stake,” the man addressed as Daniel Jackson remarked.

“I’m more curious about what the shelled things were than what you guys do about it,” Claudia added.

“It’s not something that you need to know about, young lady,” O’Neill replied.

“I’ll be the judge of that,” Claudia replied.

“Is she always like this?” Carter asked.

“Yeah, but you become accustomed to it,” Pete replied with a shrug.

“Sounds about right, “Carter replied.

“Look, we’re all dancing around the central subject, and you should know that we can’t exactly open up about what we do or the things that we have to deal with,” O’Neill said.

“Especially when it comes to a matter of national security.”

“I understand, but at least give me, I mean us, something to go on,” said Myka.

”Do you believe in little green, uh, grey men?” asked Daniel suddenly.

“Aliens, are you ‘effiing kidding me?” Pete exclaimed.

“Not by half,” Carter replied.

“Aliens?” Myka shook her head and I thought we had the market cornered on weirdness.”

“Just out of curiosity, how long has the government known about the existence of ‘uh’ little grey men? I mean, if the conspiracy theorists are right the government has to have known at least since the 1940’s and the whole Roswell, New Mexico crash landing.’ remarked Pete.

“Good guess,” Daniel replied.

“I strongly suggest that you leave it at that,” O’Neill remarked.  
***  
Conclusion

“Do you think I can transfer from this joint over to the cooler one. I mean a secret’s worth is directly proportional to the number of people from which it much be kept.”

“What are you saying?” Artie asked.

“All I’m saying is that you guys are great and all, and you took me in despite everything that happened, and cataloging cool and dangerous artifacts is an awesome job, but it’s just that I never get to do uh, ‘field work,”  
Claudia replied.

“No, I need you here, in the warehouse, for now. You may think you’re ready for the field, but as long as I’m in charge, what I say goes,” Artie replied and then darted a glance over at Myka and Pete who sat just down from him on one of the other couches in the small but cozy living area. “That goes for the two of you as well.”

“So, Artie, what are your thoughts that the United States government in collusion with the military might have been keeping the lid tightly shut on the existence of real-life aliens?” Myka asked deliberately ignoring the implicit scolding tone in Artie’s voice.

“I think that I’d rather deal with what I can see, taste, touch, and otherwise interact with using my own five senses, or in Peter’s case that extra ‘sixth sense; of his.”

“You haven’t really answered my question,” Myka pressed.

“And I don’t think that I will,” Artie sighed, “but if it’s any consolation, I don’t believe myself foolish enough to think we here on planet Earth are the only intelligent species in the galaxy and if the nice folks from the Airforce we met the other day want to go and play hero, more power to them.”

“So you do think aliens are real?”

“Isn’t that what I just said?” he exclaimed, slightly exasperated.

“Yeah, I guess you did at that,” Pete replied.

“So I can get a transfer approved?” Claudia piped up.

“No!” Artie, Myka, and Peter all exclaimed almost simultaneously.

Claudia shrugged and squirming around a bit on the sofa in order to get a more comfortable position remarked. “Well, you can’t blame a girl for trying.”

**Author's Note:**

> Written and posted as an extra for skieswideopen for the live journal-based 2013 X-over Exchange Challenge.


End file.
